Page 8 of The Heiress Masquerade (Dollar Princess #2)

The sounds of the waltz drifting up to the balcony from the orchestra playing down in the ballroom below were enough to give Harrison a headache. Why he’d come to Lord Anderson’s ball when he should be back in his office trying to finish off the damn paperwork he’d been trying to get done all bloody afternoon, he really didn’t know.

Though it might have had something to do with how every time he tried to do his paperwork, all he ended up doing was thinking about that darn woman and how even when she was chastising him, constant thoughts of kissing her had intruded.

How could he want to kiss such a harpy?

Thankfully, he’d kept things professional, and kept his hands to himself. Now, all he had to do was stop thinking about the blasted lady…something far easier said than done.

How could his thoughts be so consumed by a woman he’d only just met? A woman that was off-limits but that tempted him like no other? How could a woman he found so utterly annoying and bossy entice him without even trying, to the point of distracting him from his work? And his work was his everything.

Ben often joked Harrison was married to his job, but it was true. Work had been his absolute salvation during a time when he’d been completely alone and lost as a young boy. It had given him a sense of purpose and drive, providing him with more happiness and contentment than another person ever had, so he’d dedicated his life to succeeding at it. And he wasn’t going to let anyone, not even a woman as damned attractive as Yvette Jenkins was, distract him from his ultimate goal in life.

“A penny for your thoughts?” a soft and sultry voice whispered from behind him.

Harrison felt like sighing, but he straightened from where he’d been leaning against one of the balcony pillars and turned around to face the woman.

“Lady Whitley,” he said with an incline of his head, watching the blonde beauty flinch slightly at the use of her title coming from his lips. He didn’t want to hurt her, but the sooner the young widow realized he was serious about not continuing their relationship, the better.

She wanted to marry again and have children while she was young enough to, and Harrison couldn’t blame her for that, but it wasn’t part of his plans. At least not yet anyhow, and not with her, even though she’d make him a perfect countess, given she never argued nor spoke out of turn. Unlike Miss Jenkins, which was all she seemed to do. Why he was thinking of Miss Jenkins again was a bloody mystery. He had to get the woman out of his head.

“My dear Harrison, just because we’re no longer intimate with each other doesn’t mean you have to be so formal. You can still call me Jane. We have, after all, shared some lovely times together, haven’t we?”

“We have, Jane,” he relented, seeing the hurt in her hazel eyes. “However, you know I’m not in a position to offer you what you want or deserve, and it’s not fair to you to pretend otherwise.”

“I understand that and I appreciate you being so honest,” she said with a sad smile. “Though I do miss your company. Perhaps we can stay friends? I’ve been helpful in introducing you to my circle of acquaintances for your business, which I know means everything to you, and I do so enjoy spending time with you.”

The elegant widow had been a perfect companion to take to the opera and balls; she was beautiful, poised, and knew everyone, which was helpful, but their conversations had always been so polite and calm. Then when she’d started to hint at marriage, Harrison had known it was time to end things with the lady before she became too attached. “Friends only? Nothing more?”

She smiled. “I know your work is your true love, and I have no intention of resuming where we left off. I promise it will be friends and nothing more. What do you say?”

It couldn’t hurt, and she did know everyone and everything. “Friends it is then.”

“Excellent.” Her smile spread right across her face and she clapped her hands together. “Now, as a friend, I’m in need of dance; will you assist me?”

Harrison reluctantly smiled. Jane was always charming and personable, and most men found her difficult to resist. “Very well.”

“Wonderful.” She grinned and threaded her arm through his as they commenced walking along the landing toward the stairs leading down to the ballroom below. “Now, as my friend, I also find myself in need of your expert business advice. My accountant says I have about twenty thousand pounds I should be investing, rather than have languishing in the bank. Can I take you for a quick lunch on Monday and pick your brain about some shares I’m considering purchasing?”

“Men rarely say no to you, do they?”

“You’re the first to, Harrison Stone,” she replied. “And I hope you’ll be the last, so please don’t say no to me again, because I really do need to pick your business brain, and I promise you that’s all it is.”

“Very well,” Harrison grumbled with a small smile. He did have a soft spot for her. She was a resilient lady who’d had to endure a great deal of gossip five years ago, after being widowed only a month after marrying a man who’d been sixty years older than she was, and who unfortunately decided to meet his maker in the middle of trying to get his new countess pregnant. The details of which should have been private but had been bandied about by all of Society not even twenty-four hours after the man’s demise. “Though it will have to be a quick and early lunch as I have a meeting Monday afternoon.”

“I’ll make certain it is,” she said, squeezing his forearm lightly with her gloved hand as he led her to the bottom of the stairs and began walking along the hallway to the ballroom.

“I need to talk to you!” a loud voice boomed from the dark corridor ahead.

Harrison watched as his uncle stepped out from the shadows of the hallway, almost like he’d been waiting there for him. Which he probably had.

“It will have to wait,” Harrison said. “I’ve promised Lady Whitley a dance.”

“It can’t bloody wait!” His uncle grabbed Harrison by the lapels of his jacket and shook them, an almost wild desperation in his actions, especially considering he was a foot shorter than Harrison and weighed a good thirty pounds less.

“Remove your hands from me, Uncle Reginald .” Harrison spat out the last word like it was a curse, knowing the man hated any reminder of them being related. “Unless you want me to break them while I remove them for you?”

His uncle seemed to realize the perilous position he’d put himself in, abruptly letting go of the material and taking a hasty step out of arm’s reach from Harrison.

“This is urgent. You know I wouldn’t have accosted you otherwise,” his uncle replied, looking far more desperate than Harrison had ever seen him before. “We must talk now, in private.” The man’s eyes darted over to Jane.

“I think that’s my cue to leave,” Jane said, extracting her hand from the crook of Harrison’s elbow.

“No, stay,” Harrison said. His uncle might think he could order anyone about, being the Earl of Carlisle, but Harrison was having none of it.

“It’s fine,” Jane said. “The earl already seems greatly agitated and I would hate to add to that. Good evening, gentlemen. I shall see you for lunch on Monday if I don’t see you later tonight.” She smiled at him before deftly walking around the earl and down the hallway, the sound of her footsteps gradually receding as she left them alone.

“You’ve got two minutes.” Harrison pulled out his pocket watch and made note of the time on the dial. His uncle had had little time for him over the years, so Harrison was happy to return the favor in full. “So talk fast.”

“You must marry an heiress!”

Of all things Harrison had expected the man to say, that hadn’t even been on the list. “What the devil have you done now?”

His uncle tugged his collar and licked his lips. “Nothing a quick marriage to an heiress won’t fix. In fact, another Dollar Princess has arrived in London today and she’s worth one million pounds. You must court her and convince her to marry you, which should be easy given your boss is her father.”

The last discussion they’d had relating to Harrison’s future and marriage was nearly five years ago, just shortly after he arrived in London, when his uncle had summoned him to his residence and demanded Harrison marry one of the man’s daughters, who were also Harrison’s first cousins. Apparently, his uncle had rationalized in his head that that would be the only suitable arrangement to make amends for the erroneous situation of the man having no son, and Harrison being his unwanted heir.

In his uncle’s opinion, given Harrison’s mother had been a base-born housemaid and should never have married into the family in the first place, the least Harrison could do to right that supposed wrong was ensure his cousins were provided for and that the earldom stayed within his uncle’s line of the family as it was meant to have done.

Harrison had declined, infuriating his uncle to the point where his uncle had cut him directly, never acknowledging him at any social functions. Which hadn’t bothered Harrison in the slightest as he didn’t give a damn about the man or Society. But then about two years ago his uncle had approached him, begging for a loan, saying that the cost of giving his five daughters season after season without having married them off to anyone was bankrupting the estate.

Harrison had laughed, truly enjoying the irony that the lofty Earl of Carlisle was begging him, the mere son of a maid, to save the great Carlisle Estate, with the fortune Harrison had made in trade. It had been quite ironic and Harrison had sent his uncle packing, more than content for the entire estate to burn to the ground for all he cared, given they’d banished his parents and then refused to have anything to do with Harrison, even after his parents’ deaths when they were informed he was all alone with not a penny to his name. They’d chosen to let an eight-year-old boy fend for himself in New York City, rather than debase themselves by accepting him.

However, Harrison had changed his mind about saving the estate after his cousin, Amelia, the Earl’s eldest daughter, visited him the next day at his office, without the earl’s knowledge. He’d been about to have her thrown out when she’d calmly started reciting from memory dozens and dozens of names of all their servants and what position they filled in the earl’s household and how long they’d worked for the family. By simply reciting their names, she’d let him know of all the innocent employees he’d be destroying the livelihoods of if he did nothing to help his uncle as he’d originally intended.

So he’d found himself reluctantly agreeing to loan his uncle the money to ensure the estate wouldn’t go bankrupt, as much as it had annoyed the hell out of him doing so. But his cousin had been on the money—Harrison wouldn’t let hundreds of servants lose their positions and home, simply because of an egotistical earl who didn’t have a head for money or business. His respect for his cousin grew that day, and he didn’t mind having the occasional chat with her at the various Society events. She was bookish and had no interest in marrying, so they shared that in common and got on well together.

Unlike Harrison and the man currently standing before him, wringing his hands together, agitation rife in his gaze. “Tell me what you’ve done.” Harrison annunciated each word slowly. “And I won’t ask again.”

His uncle began nodding, almost like he was a puppet. “Yes, well, um, you see I was trying to make some money, to um, repay the loan from you, of course, and well, um, this phenomenal investment opportunity presented itself to me, and it promised returns of up to fifty percent. It was an opportunity of a lifetime.”

“No legitimate investment can offer a return that good.”

“I realize that now…” His uncle’s voice trailed off. “But, at the time, well, it seemed so promising, and a gentleman I trusted was investing and doing me a favor to let me invest in the scheme, too…so I did.”

“How much did you lose?” Harrison said, his top teeth grinding against his bottom.

His uncle gulped heavily. “Everything. Well, everything that isn’t entailed…but yes, everything else, or at least I will lose everything if I can’t repay the bank by the end of the month. They at least gave me until then to try to rectify the situation.”

“How many pounds?”

The man bit his bottom lip. “About two hundred thousand…give or take a little.”

“Fuck.” He’d known his uncle was a fool, but after nearly losing everything before with his blatant spending, Harrison had assumed the man had learned his lesson, especially having had to come and grovel to Harrison to bail him out.

But clearly no lesson had been learned in the slightest, and now Harrison would have to deal with this even bigger mess his uncle had created. Yes, fuck was really the only way to describe the whole damn mess of a situation.